A country that embraces bitcoin early will have a lot of rich people later

[dan123]

Countries are not in the habit of engaging in foreign currency speculation.
Especially because it doesn't involve any wealth creation, only shuffling between those who bet poorly and those who bet well.

Oh no the 'trickle down' economists have arrived.

"Trickle down economics" aka "Voodoo Economics" were both terms invented and used by the Bush senior smear campaign when he ran against Reagan.

Well this isn't speculation.  If a small country made bitcoin it's official currency and backed some paper made bills with it, the price of bitcoins would skyrocket.  The 10 billion Market Cap of bitcoin might go up to a trillion on that news.
This could be enough of an incentive for a country (Or a group of rich people) to do this.

As for the poor countries obligations, if they can't pay people, they can't pay people.  What good is printing more useless money anyway.

[taltamir]

As for the poor countries obligations, if they can't pay people, they can't pay people.  What good is printing more useless money anyway.

The "good" is that it allows them to confiscate funds from the populace via inflation (which is really really bad; but they keep on doing it)

[theta]

Countries are not in the habit of engaging in foreign currency speculation.
Especially because it doesn't involve any wealth creation, only shuffling between those who bet poorly and those who bet well.

Oh no the 'trickle down' economists have arrived.

"Trickle down economics" aka "Voodoo Economics" were both terms invented and used by the Bush senior smear campaign when he ran against Reagan.

Well this isn't speculation.  If a small country made bitcoin it's official currency and backed some paper made bills with it, the price of bitcoins would skyrocket.  The 10 billion Market Cap of bitcoin might go up to a trillion on that news.
This could be enough of an incentive for a country (Or a group of rich people) to do this.

As for the poor countries obligations, if they can't pay people, they can't pay people.  What good is printing more useless money anyway.

You really need to understand the difference between assets and liabilities. A country's official currency is the unit of its liabilities. No country would ever want a hard deflationary asset as the unit of its liabilities. Ever heard of currency wars? The aim on these is to have the cheapest currency, not the most expensive.

Works the same (or similar) way for companies.
Let's say you are a company that makes software. You hire someone to develop a new app. If you agreed to pay them in bitcoins when the price was $10 and you have them a salary of 5000BTC, thinking that you would have $200k in revenue, and by the time you had to pay them BTC went to $1000, your company is bankrupt despite making your sales target.

[dan123]

As for the poor countries obligations, if they can't pay people, they can't pay people.  What good is printing more useless money anyway.

The "good" is that it allows them to confiscate funds from the populace via inflation (which is really really bad; but they keep on doing it)

Yes, but then no one will keep their money in that currency anyway.  People in these poor countries will keep their money in usd, euros or whatever.
By being the 1st country to do this, there's a good chance the bitcoin price will keep going up and they can even pay their workers less money as time goes on.
If they pay their government workers in their own currency, they have to keep giving them raises to keep up with inflation.

Yes, they won't control the money supply, but what's the use of printing money that no-one uses.  Their economy would be better off and if all major transactions were done in bitcoin, less fraud, faster transactions...  I'm not saying every small country will want to do this.  It only takes 1.  Or it could be a city that has it's own currency.

[dan123]

Countries are not in the habit of engaging in foreign currency speculation.
Especially because it doesn't involve any wealth creation, only shuffling between those who bet poorly and those who bet well.

Oh no the 'trickle down' economists have arrived.

"Trickle down economics" aka "Voodoo Economics" were both terms invented and used by the Bush senior smear campaign when he ran against Reagan.

Well this isn't speculation.  If a small country made bitcoin it's official currency and backed some paper made bills with it, the price of bitcoins would skyrocket.  The 10 billion Market Cap of bitcoin might go up to a trillion on that news.
This could be enough of an incentive for a country (Or a group of rich people) to do this.

As for the poor countries obligations, if they can't pay people, they can't pay people.  What good is printing more useless money anyway.

You really need to understand the difference between assets and liabilities. A country's official currency is the unit of its liabilities. No country would ever want a hard deflationary asset as the unit of its liabilities. Ever heard of currency wars? The aim on these is to have the cheapest currency, not the most expensive.

Works the same (or similar) way for companies.
Let's say you are a company that makes software. You hire someone to develop a new app. If you agreed to pay them in bitcoins when the price was $10 and you have them a salary of 5000BTC, thinking that you would have $200k in revenue, and by the time you had to pay them BTC went to $1000, your company is bankrupt despite making your sales target.

Well until 1/2 the world money supply is in bitcoins, it would be the number of btc compared to X amount of dollars or something.  There's a company in poland paying their employees in bitcoins if they want. I'm sure it's done in a similar manner.

[skovbitcoin]

Countries are not in the habit of engaging in foreign currency speculation.
Especially because it doesn't involve any wealth creation, only shuffling between those who bet poorly and those who bet well.

Oh no the 'trickle down' economists have arrived.

"Trickle down economics" aka "Voodoo Economics" were both terms invented and used by the Bush senior smear campaign when he ran against Reagan.

Well this isn't speculation.  If a small country made bitcoin it's official currency and backed some paper made bills with it, the price of bitcoins would skyrocket.  The 10 billion Market Cap of bitcoin might go up to a trillion on that news.
This could be enough of an incentive for a country (Or a group of rich people) to do this.

As for the poor countries obligations, if they can't pay people, they can't pay people.  What good is printing more useless money anyway.

You really need to understand the difference between assets and liabilities. A country's official currency is the unit of its liabilities. No country would ever want a hard deflationary asset as the unit of its liabilities. Ever heard of currency wars? The aim on these is to have the cheapest currency, not the most expensive.

Works the same (or similar) way for companies.
Let's say you are a company that makes software. You hire someone to develop a new app. If you agreed to pay them in bitcoins when the price was $10 and you have them a salary of 5000BTC, thinking that you would have $200k in revenue, and by the time you had to pay them BTC went to $1000, your company is bankrupt despite making your sales target.

Well until 1/2 the world money supply is in bitcoins, it would be the number of btc compared to X amount of dollars or something.  There's a company in poland paying their employees in bitcoins if they want. I'm sure it's done in a similar manner.

Agreed, you'd be paying them presumably at the market rate, convertible afterwards if the employee decided, passing the risk onto them for choosing the Bitcoin salary option. Besides, at this point where adoption was becoming more normal I think it's safe to say the price would not be moving from $10 to $1000 over any short period of time...

[theta]

There's a company in poland paying their employees in bitcoins if they want. I'm sure it's done in a similar manner.

What do u mean in a similar manner? I'm sure the pay is not agreed at a fixed amount of BTC, but at a fixed amount of fiat. Otherwise my previous example stands. Employees that signed up a year ago would be too expensive now. Company would be bankrupt. Please provide evidence to the contrary.

[KeyserSozeMC]

i was actually thinking of a day that a ruined country like idk syria makes bitcoin their official currency. that would get things crazy

the only prob is that everyone will need a pc for that .. maybe some other way...

A Android phone is enough. Most of people can buy a cheap Android phone

[luqash3]

Really dan123 do you think country that accept bitcoins will be richest soon? In my opinion it would be in the dreams only after all it is a digital currency that is facing tough times from world powers. And how come you think so in the light of fact that it is one of the most volatile currency these days

[dan123]

Really dan123 do you think country that accept bitcoins will be richest soon? In my opinion it would be in the dreams only after all it is a digital currency that is facing tough times from world powers. And how come you think so in the light of fact that it is one of the most volatile currency these days

Not the richest in the world, but they would gain a good amount of money from it.  You can trade based on current USD value.

How much do you think btc would go up if a small country announced it would use it as currency and back their dollars by it?  Would it hit $1 trillion market cap then?  Maybe?  Also at 1 Trillion market cap, it wouldn't be as volatile.  What if the leader of that country also invested 1 Million or more in bitcoins?  There are many selfish reasons why this could happen?  News like this would make the currency skyrocket.  What if a country announced it and then a month later said they're not going to do it.

Now what if they used litecoins or another?  Would that currency then overtake bitcoin?